Asus Zenbook Refresh Introduces Several New Ultrabooks

Asus has announced a refresh of its Zenbook lineup of Intel-powered ultrabooks to accompany its new VivoBooks and VivoTabs running Windows 8. Available next month, the PC OEM is introducing six new laptop SKUs with Ivy Bridge processors and dedicated graphics cards from NVIDIA. Specifically, the Asus Zenbook UX21A, UX31A, UX32VD, UX42VS, US52VS, and U500VZ ultrabooks are coming soon with the refresh.

The UX31A Ultrabook with touch display

The new Zenbooks will have Ivy Bridge processors, up to 10GB of memory, and up to NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M graphics. They maintain the aluminum chassis of Asus’ previous generation ultrabooks but up the hardware ante. The company has expanded the lineup to include models with 11.6,” 13.3,” 14,” and 15.6” IPS displays, backlit keyboards, and multitouch trackpads. The U500VZ and UX31A can even be outfitted with capacitive touchscreen displays.

The ASUS UX42VS Zenbook

The VX42VS further includes an optical drive, but otherwise the Zenbooks source of storage lies in solid state or hybrid hard drives. Interestingly, the UX32VD and U500VZ can even be configured with two 256GB solid state drives in RAID 0 (Ryan’s favorite kind of RAID).

The ASUS UX52VS Zenbook

The following chart outlines all the known specifications. Note that several of the ultrabooks are not listed on Asus’ website yet so exact dimensions are unknown for the UX52VS and U500VZ in particular.

Zenbook

UX21A

UX31A

UX32VD

UX42VS

UX52VS

U500VZ

Dimensions

299 x 196.8 x 3 ~ 17 mm

325 x 223 x 3 ~18 mm

325 x 223 x 5.5 ~18 mm

14" tapers to 6mm

~15" tapers to 6mm

~15"

Weight

1.1 kg

1.3 kg

1.45 kg

1.5kg

2.2kg

2 kg

Processor

i5 3317U or i7 3517U

i5 3317U or i7 3517U

i5 3317U or i7 3517U

i3, i5, or i7 IVB

i5 or i7 ULV IVB

i7 std voltage

RAM

4GB

8GB*

6GB*

6GB

10GB

8GB

Graphics

HD4000

HD4000

GT620M

GT645M

GT645M

GT650M

Storage

256GB SSD

256GB SSD

2 x 256GB SSD (RAID 0)

1TB Hybrid Hard Drive

1TB Hybrid Hard Drive

2 x 256GB SSD (RAID 0)

*onboard + 1 x SODIMM

All of the new Zenbook laptops will be available in November and will come with Windows 8. Pricing will range from $699 to $1999 for the premium model (The U500VZ). Specific pricing details should become available closer to launch.